29th september - solidarity actions

The international Anarchist Black Cross network and other anti-prison
activists declared the 29th of September as the International day of
solidarity for the Aachen2. The Aachen2 are the anarchists Gabriel Pombo da
Silva and Jose Fernandez Delgado, who both served many years time in the
notorious and inhuman isolation custody system F.I.E.S. in Spain.
Fortunately, they could leave their jail behind, by escaping and going
underground. On 28 June, 2004 they got into in a police control in Aachen
where they finally got arrested, together with Gabriel´s sister, Begoña
Pombo da Silva, and Bart de Geeter, an anarchist comrade from Belgium. On
the 28th September, 2005 the sentences were proclaimed, after a contracted
and infantile trial, where they got condemned for their anarchist
attitude, - José has to stay for 14 years and Gabriel for 13 years behind
bars.
To show our solidarity with the prisoners on the streets and to let them be
a part of this, we organised demontrations in Rheinbach and Aachen in front
of the respective prisons. Altogether between 60 and 70 solidary minded
people from Switzerland, the Netherlands, Belgium, France, Spain and Germany
showed up. Unfortunately only very few people from Germany came, since both
the topic prison and solidarity with arrested comrades still play a
subordinated role within the operating fields of the "german radical left".
It also seems that only allegedly "innocent ones" are aloud to experience a
broader support in Germany. We have been critizing this situation for quite
a while now.
Marco Camensich, an eco-anarchist prisoner from Switzerland, decided to take
part in the action day with a hunger strike from 16. up to 29. September.
Gabriel and José followed him and as well Joaquín Garcés Villacampa, an
anarchist F.I.E.S. - prisoners of the Spanish state, supported them between
the 28 and the 30 of september.
In Rheinbach we met around 12am in front of the local prison to show our
solidarity with José. Armed with a sound system, we tried to overcome the
isolation conditions behind the walls and to break the deadly monotony, at
least for a short time. Besides this, a vast number of tennis balls, with
diverse messages written on, were thrown inside over the walls. Speeches
were read about Aachen2 and the current situation of the militante gruppe
defendants in Berlin, as well as some greetings from anti-fascist Christian
S., inprisoned in Berlin Tegel.
About 4pm we met again in Aachen to send our warmest greetings to Gabriel
and all other prisoners in struggle and to give out a shout of our hate and
rage, based on the miserable conditions the inmates have to "live" in.
Despite a never-ending rain, we moved as a spontaneous demonstration around
almost the whole prison, in order to catch the attention of as many
prisoners as possible. It was particularly pleasant that the prisoners
reacted well to our demonstrations, through screaming slogans and cries of
approval.
The local police officers were incapable to break our determination, neither
meanwhile we were throwing the tennis balls in Rheinbach, nor while walking
around (almost) the whole prison in Aachen. The road around the prison in
Aachen was not permited to us, therefore we had to take it. Except some
smaller scuffles with the green spoil-sports, there was however no further
contentions. The determination of our appearance towards the police, helped
us to perform our demonstration in the way we wanted it.
In the evening of the 28th, up to 30 persons met in front of the german
consulate in Bilbao in solidarity with the prisoners, since because of
technical problems they were not able to join our common demonstration.
Also in England as in other countries many different solidarity acions took
place.
On the 21st of September, a demonstration with a live hip hop concert was
held in Berlin under the slogan "For more self-determined spaces - against
all institutes of coercion". With the help of speeches and strained banners
over the road, it was called attention for the imprisonment of Gabriel and
José and other ones. Around 150 people participated in this rally.
These will not be the last actions of our fight towards the freedom of the
Aachen2, we will also fight on the streets in the future to show our refusal
against their arrest and to declare our active solidarity.

Make a hole out of the prisons!

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